YouTube's new strategy to combat the clickbait plague

You thumbnails (those thumbnail images that serve as a preview or visual representation of larger content) are the YouTube equivalent of a movie poster. Its function is to convince the person to click and watch, highlighting that video among the sea of ​​content that tries to attract users' attention.

Most who use the platform have been tricked into clicking on a video because of a catchy title and/or an attractive thumbnail, only to be disappointed when the actual content has nothing to do with what the title promised.

Using attention-grabbing (often misleading) thumbnails and titles has become standard practice on YouTube. Things got to the point where the platform announced a move to crack down on “explicit” cases of clickbait (images and titles created to generate more clicks).

Starting in India, YouTube will take action against videos that feature titles and thumbnails of clickbaitespecially those that reference breaking news or current events.

YouTube spokesperson Jack Malon told the site The Verge that the movement will extend to more countries in the coming months. While creators will not receive warnings during the initial phase, any videos that violate the new policy will be removed.

“We are reinforcing our measures to deal with clickbait explicit on YouTube. This means we will increase enforcement against posts where the title or thumbnail promises something that the video doesn't deliver,” the company said in a post on the Google India blog. “This can leave users feeling frustrated or misled, especially when they go to YouTube looking for important or up-to-date information.”

YouTube provided examples of clickbait explicit, such as a video titled “The president has resigned!” which doesn't talk about resignation, other than a “Top Political News” thumbnail attached to a video with no actual news content.

Starting with India, the movement will extend to more countries in the coming months.

Accusations of clickbait are common, so YouTube's – quite restricted – definition is useful for those who want to avoid problems with the platform.

“We will continue to educate breeders and our enforcement efforts will prioritize new uploads of video going forward”, added the company in the post.

The question of how to deal with misinformation has been a challenge on the internet for a long time. Last year, YouTube itself introduced a number of changes, including a feature that allows users to leave notes correcting incorrect information, similar to X/Twitter's Community Notes.

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Eve Upton-Clark is a journalist specializing in digital culture and society. find out more

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